


To Fight and To Fly

by peachchild



Series: Second Star to the Right [2]
Category: Peter Pan (1953), The Hobbit (2012) RPF
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-04-29
Updated: 2013-04-29
Packaged: 2017-12-09 05:19:54
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,748
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/770440
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/peachchild/pseuds/peachchild
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Aidan grows up, and Dean deals with the growing pains.</p>
            </blockquote>





	To Fight and To Fly

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Neeka](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Neeka/gifts).



> First of all, thank everyone who commented and gave kudos and bookmarked "Straight On Till Morning" and made me feel so welcomed and excited to be in this fandom. :3 
> 
> Also, I would like to note that [this song](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=un-KTpvCPXo) was my jam while writing this.

Aidan only met Captain Hook once, because he did his very best to avoid him after that.

He and Peter flew over the mountains and down toward the sea, dashing past mermaids that waved and giggled as they went, and over the billowing sails of Hook's ship, fast enough to make them flutter with their own sharp breeze. Peter pulled up to a halt, just beyond the clouds, out of sight of the pirates, that grin on his face that always means trouble. "You distract him," he told Aidan, tapping the side of his nose with a wink. "I'm going to get us a little parting gift."

Aidan did as he was told, because it's hard for a Lost Boy to refuse Peter Pan, and he dipped down over the deck with just Peter's little knife in hand, and neatly sliced the feather off Hook's hat - a parting gift of his own. 

Hook was, understandably, displeased, and he chased Aidan about the deck, slashing his cutlass in his direction. Aidan only managed to avoid being sliced in half by suspending himself in the air, just out of Hook's reach. He waved the feather at him, grinning, and Hook yelled and swore and snarled. Peter caught Aidan's eye at last, waving for him to follow him, a small treasure chest tucked under his arm. Aidan had looked away a moment too long, and he realized it only when he felt the slice of a blade into his side. He gasped, leaped up and away, holding his hand against the wound, and dashed after Peter, sick to his stomach.

Before he even realized it, he was over the mountains and the sea and out of Neverland. But when he did realize it, he knew exactly where to go.

Aidan stumble-landed in his kitchen, hitting his knee on the linoleum. He grimaced up at Dean, who was standing at the counter, his cup of tea halfway to his lips. "I need - Can you-?"

Dean put down his mug and knelt before him, peeled his blood-sticky hand from his side, sucked a breath in through his teeth. He didn't speak. Instead, he fished a clean dishcloth from the nearest drawer and pressed it to his side, holding Aidan's hand over it, and gathered him up in his arms to take him to the hospital.

They weren't there long. With the amount of blood he was losing and the deepness of the wound, they saw to him immediately. Aidan rested on his side, his arm tucked under his head, drowsy from anesthesia, and listened to Dean just outside the door, his voice raising slightly with his frustration each minute, because Aidan was a Lost Boy, and that made everything more difficult. 

When he came back into the room, he sat in a chair at Aidan's side, his fingers curled around his wrist. He still didn't speak, hadn't spoken to Aidan since he came, and it made him sick to his stomach. "I'm sorry," he murmured, slurring his words a little. "I didn't mean to get hurt."

Dean didn't say anything, which he kind of expected. He just brought his hand to his mouth and kissed his knuckles. 

* * *

Aidan loves the mornings the best.

He almost always wakes up first, because Dean is that grumpy person who tries to stay asleep for as long as he possibly can. So Aidan slides and wiggles his way under Dean's arm and nuzzles in against his neck, mouthing softly beneath his ear, along his hairline and his jaw. Dean makes a sound that's more a soft rumble through his chest and throat than actual vocals and turns his head toward Aidan, his eyes still closed, like he's seeking out his mouth, so Aidan presses several soft kisses to his lips, curling his arms around Dean's shoulders.

When he finally stirs, and those big blue eyes of his blink open, narrowing against the sunshine streaming in through the curtains, he drags himself over to cover Aidan's body with his own, dipping his head to kiss him more thoroughly - and Aidan thinks this is his favorite part. There isn't any part of him that doesn't love Dean so completely that it knocks him down sometimes - and there isn't any part of Dean that he doesn't love that completely. So now, he loves the fact that Dean's hair sticks up on one side from being pressed into the pillow, and he loves the fact that he's still sleepy enough that he just sort of rests his body against Aidan's instead of supporting his own weight, and he loves the scrape of stubble across his face as they kiss - and he even sort of loves his morning breath. 

When his muscles are finally awake enough, Aidan prods him out of bed and toward the bathroom. He runs the shower just slightly too hot, just how Dean likes it, and Dean lets him scrub shampoo through his hair, humming happily as he does so, his fingers curled around Aidan's hip to keep himself from swaying too much.

(Aidan asked him once what he did to get himself out of bed before Aidan. Dean said the smell of coffee was the only thing that would do it for him, so the timer on his coffee maker was essential.

He doesn't set the timer anymore, so Aidan figures he has suitably replaced coffee in Dean's morning routine.)

After they've showered and teased each other and shouted and flailed while trying to rub each other's hair dry with their towels, Aidan hops up onto the counter in his boxers to watch Dean shave. If mornings are his favorite part of the day, watching Dean shave is his favorite part of the morning. His hands are so precise, so careful, the line between his brow deep with his concentration, even as he is sure to keep the expression of the rest of his face smooth. There's something about the look that makes heat swirl warm and low in Aidan's belly, and his fingers grip the edge of the counter. 

Dean rinses his razor and wipes his face and grins at the expression on Aidan's face. "What?"

He picks up the razor and shaving cream. "Do me."

Dean blinks. "What?"

"Shave me. Please?"

"Why?" Dean removes the items from his hands even as he asks. "I thought you liked having hair on your face."

"I do." Aidan looks away, kicks his heels against the cabinets. He does, in a way, because it makes him feel older, less like a child in the face of Dean's obvious adulthood and the fact that his life is so obviously put-together; Aidan does his best to feel like he hasn't just wedged himself into it. "I just want to know what it feels like."

Dean shrugs, because Dean is often so quick to please Aidan, even though Aidan is pretty sure he doesn't deserve it. "Well, buckle up then; it's a thrill ride," he jokes, spraying some of the cream into his hand. It's cold on Aidan's face, and he tries not to wrinkle his nose when Dean spreads it over his top lip and under his chin. For a while, the sharp scratching of the razor across Aidan's skin is the only sound between them, that and the breaths Dean probably doesn't realize he is breathing quite so loudly. His hands are steady, one cupped around Aidan's neck, holding him still, the other moving the razor in steady strokes over his skin, flicking shaving cream into the sink, carefully working around the edges of his mouth and nose and the dip of his chin, scraping slow and steady over the jut of his Adam's apple. Aidan feels oddly serene. His palms press lightly against the slightly damp skin of Dean's ribs.

When he's finished, Dean very gently wipes the excess shaving cream from Aidan's face and nudges him around to look at his reflection. He doesn't really care how he looks, but the absence of hair on his jaw reminds him of being a Boy - of being a Boy forever, and it makes him a little nauseous. Still, Dean is smoothing his hand down his back, and he loves the feel of it, so he turns back with a grin and wraps his arms around his neck and his legs around his hips, drawing him in for a kiss. "Take me back to bed," he purrs, running his heel up the back of his thigh, and Dean is so good to him: he does so without a word of protest.

* * *

Aidan stayed with Dean until the stitches could come out, which was a long time for Aidan to be away from Neverland. It felt even longer because Dean was still just barely speaking to him.

Three nights in, Aidan crawled onto the couch with him, one hand pressed to his ribs, like that in itself would keep him from popping his stitches, because the couch was where Dean had been sleeping, claiming that Aidan would be more comfortable sleeping in the bed if he didn't have to share it; there was also less likelihood of Dean somehow accidentally hurting him.

None of that particularly mattered to Aidan, as was obvious from the fact that he was snuggling his way between the back of the couch and Dean's sleeping body, nuzzling his face in against Dean's neck. He knew the moment that Dean woke, because the muscles in his shoulders and forearms went tense, and Aidan held his breath and was suitably disappointed when Dean rolled off the couch and to his feet and hauled Aidan to his feet. "C'me on."

Aidan let him take his hand and lead him back into the bedroom. He let him help him into the bed, an awful stick in his throat keeping him from speaking. He let him tuck the blankets around his shoulders, looking mournfully up into Dean's weary face, his blue eyes bright with sleep through the dark, his hair pressed flat on one side and sticking up on the other. Only when he turned away did Aidan reach for him, grasping his wrist. "Dean, I -"

Dean hushed him gently. "Bedtime," he murmured, and Aidan almost protested that he wasn't a _child_ , but then Dean was moving around to the other side of the bed, slipping under the blankets with him. He wouldn't hold him, still too sure he would somehow break him, but he did sleep with his fingers curled around Aidan's wrist, and Aidan thought that was good enough.

He woke the next morning to Dean pressing a kiss to the corner of his eye, and another to the corner of his mouth, his fingers petting through his hair. Aidan practically purred, stretching like a cat until his back popped, not caring how the movement pulled at his stitches, made pain run up through his ribs. "Good morning," he slurred out sleepily, curling his arm around Dean's neck, scrubbing his fingernails through the short hair at the back of his head. "You're not cross with me anymore?"

"I wasn't cross with you to begin with," Dean murmured, though the flush across the tips of his ears said otherwise. "I was just - You're just so _reckless_ sometimes."

"'m not!" Aidan protested, and tried his best to roll onto his side, even with the twinge and pull of the stitches along his ribs protesting the movement. He settled for wiggling in closer to Dean. "It was an accident. Accidents happen."

"Yes, but not in Neverland. You told me Neverland was safe."

Aidan went abruptly silent, like someone pulled the emergency brake on his vocal cords. _Oh_. He let his hand fall to rest against Dean's chest, watching his arm rise and fall with his slow breaths. "It's safer in some ways," he offered gently. "Perhaps not in others."

Dean's jaw clenched, a sharp line in his otherwise soft face. "I get scared when you're away from me," he admitted, looking over at him, the sun striping his face through the blinds at the window. His eyes were startling, intense. Aidan didn't say anything, because there was nothing to say. But Dean laced their fingers together, held his hand close against his chest, where his heart beat a steady rhythm beneath his ribs, and he found he didn't have to.

* * *

He has always rather loved overcast days.

"They're full of secrets," he told Dean one day, as they stood on their balcony, watching a storm roll in from the sea. The clouds rocked sleepily in, a snore of thunder reaching them from miles away. "Those days the clouds look like a sheet - when the sky's just grey - those are the best times to go flying."

"Why's that?" Dean asked in that soft way he has, his hand smoothing down his back, like he was just reminded again why he loves him.

"They're Neverland clouds." Aidan rested his chin on his hands, where they rested on the railing. "You know, it's almost always sunny in Neverland, so the clouds've all got to go somewhere. They come here. And they're full of pixie dust, and if you fly with them, they'll play. They do jigs and play practical jokes and make obstacle courses. And no one down here can see you - because the clouds are hiding it all from the people who wouldn't understand it."

Dean nodded like he understood, but Aidan wasn't sure he did. He couldn't really blame him for that, of course; he didn't know what it was like to be saturated with that manic, metallic smell of pixie dust, to spread his arms and soar and dip through the sky - and part of him felt a little sad for him, even though he knew that Dean didn't really know what he was missing.

Of course, he had taken Dean flying, but being sprinkled with pixie dust and being dragged along by someone who has been flying for years wasn't quite the same as having the freedom of flying alone, of learning how your body works, how the air holds you and cuts apart for you and slides past you. He knows Dean enjoyed when they flew together, because he always kissed him breathless when they came back down to the ground, clinging to him like he wasn't sure that it wouldn't take them right back up into the air again. (Sometimes, it did, because Aidan, feeling cheeky, wrapped his arms around him and lifted them up a few hundred meters, and Dean laughed and called him Superman.)

Sometimes, on overcast days, he wakes feeling weighed down by the tragedy of never getting to fly again. He peers out at the sky from his nest of blankets, and his heart reaches out, clawing to fly - to _fly_ \- and it makes his stomach twist with nausea, full of longing. Dean coaxes him from bed with sugary tea and an egg sandwich, and they go to the roof. Last year, one of their neighbors asked their landlord for permission to plant a rooftop garden, and now the small plot in the corner is in full bloom, a beautiful wrought-iron bench positioned close to the flowers, near enough to let the sweet smell fragrance of the plants wash over them.

Aidan eats his breakfast and stares up at the sky, and smiles when a tendril of cloud breaks away, waving at him. When the wisp beckons him, the longing in his gut tugs, almost painful, and he stares down into his tea. Dean kisses his hair, so carefully aware of Aidan's feelings that he's suddenly _angry_ : because Dean knows exactly how he feels and neither of them can do anything about it.

"I hate you sometimes," he murmurs. The steam curls up from his tea. Dean is very still. "I hate that I'm stuck here, because of you, when I could have had both worlds, forever. I could be a Lost Boy, and I could stay young and I could fly - and now I can't do any of that."

And because he's wonderful, and also terrible, Dean just says, "I'm sorry."

* * *

Aidan fell in love with Dean the first time he took him flying. 

He didn't know it at the time, because he was so young, and so naive, and so unfamiliar with the responsibility of feelings like those, but when he had known him longer, he knew what the word _love_ meant, whenever he heard it, and love always meant Dean for him. 

Dean was not a good flyer. He shrieked and yelled and clung to Aidan and was clumsy and inefficient and never terribly sure he wanted to be in the sky until he was firmly back on the ground, laughing breathlessly with a flush high in his cheeks, struck still with adrenaline. They flew over the hills and plains and waters of New Zealand, and Aidan saw none of it, because Dean was so beautiful, with the wind blowing back his hair, his fingers gripping Aidan's so tightly that he could barely feel the hold, and he didn't mind in the least. 

He never wanted to fly alone again. He never wanted to fly with anyone but Dean.

When their feet touched on Dean's balcony, he drew him in to hug him, his arms wrapped securely around his shoulders, and Aidan's fingers were fists in the back of his jacket. When he pulled away, he was grinning. "Where should we go next?"

Aidan grinned back stupidly and said, "Anywhere you want," and he meant it.

* * *

They don't speak for days.

Aidan pretends to be asleep until Dean goes to work, and when he comes home in the evening, Aidan parks himself in front of the television and pretends to not notice him. Dean kisses his hair on his way out, and leaves a cup of tea on the nightstand for him, and in the evening, makes him dinner and leaves it for him to eat on the coffee table.

Aidan knows that the reason they're not speaking is because he is stubborn and Dean is hurt. He also knows that he feels sick with what he said to him, and he hates that Dean has taken to sleeping with his back to him, and Aidan can read his unhappiness in the curve of his shoulders and the jut of his shoulder blades. He doesn't know how to close the distance between them, and instead watches the gulf grow wider with each day that passes.

It's been a week, and Dean wakes him early, his hand on his shoulder, and Aidan blinks his eyes open to find him crouched at the side of the bed, smiling gently at him. "Good morning," he says quietly, because it must be just after dawn, and that is too early to speak in more than a whisper. "I need you to get up. I'm taking you somewhere today."

Aidan rubs his eyes, groaning, and rolls onto his back to stretch. But he doesn't think to protest, or to question Dean's motives, because it's just so nice to hear his voice, so he lets Dean usher him out of bed and into the bathroom to shower and get dressed while Dean himself retreats to the kitchen to make egg and bacon sandwiches - because the smell of bacon is a surefire way to increase Aidan's enthusiasm for being out of bed - which he wraps in paper towels and packs with thermoses of tea into a lunch bag to take with them in the car. When Aidan shuffles into the kitchen, he finds Dean waiting with his jacket, which he helps him into, and then he's being very gently shoved out the door and to the car.

Aidan eats his breakfast slowly, chewing sleepily and watching the countryside slide by the passenger's side window. They don't speak, but the silence between them is broken by the jazz station the radio has been stuck on for months, and the tension has bled out from between them, leaving something achingly empty and sweet. When Aidan's finished his tea and wiped his mouth and hands, he goes so far as to reach over and curl his fingers against Dean's leg, savoring the warmth of him through his jeans. His sudden longing hits him like a freight train, barreling through him, and he almost gasps at the amount he's missed him, just in these few days. Dean takes a hand from the steering wheel to lace their fingers together, squeezing his hand tightly, and Aidan almost sobs, because he told Dean that he hated him for giving him _this_ , when he couldn't possibly love Neverland if Dean wasn't a part of it, even if it was only in that he came home to share it with him. 

They've driven two hours out of the city when Dean finally pulls over into the car park of a large building on the edge of the sea. Aidan frowns. "Where are we?"

Dean grins at him and gestures with his head in the direction of the building before ducking out of the car and beckoning Aidan to follow. He runs around the car after him, taking his hand again, and they walk up side-by-side. Dean stops inside to talk to a man at the counter, and then they're led out onto what looks to be a runway behind the building.

He jerks to a halt, pulling Dean with him, and Dean turns around, frowning at him. "Alright?"

Aidan looks beyond them, then back over to him, his brows drawn together. "I... What are we doing?" 

"We're going hang-gliding." Dean draws his lip between his teeth, looks at his feet a little bashfully. "Look, I know it's nothing like really flying, but - I mean, I thought it might be something... close. Something that might help a little bit, since you can't actually fly anymore."

Aidan opens his mouth to speak, but just ends up closing it again, because this man in front of him - this extraordinary man that he has hurt in such a ridiculously cruel way - has done something so terribly sweet for him, and he loathes himself. So he squeezes his hand. "So what are we waiting for? Let's glide."

Dean blesses him with a smile that could rival the sun.

* * *

Most people in the world have to seek out pixie dust, in order to see Neverland, or to fly, or to see the glimmer of magic that has always existed in the world. Some people are born with it - usually not with enough to attract the attention of fairies and pixies - though sometimes they catch the eye of Peter Pan - and are blessed with a certain glow about them that attracts people to their presence.

Dean is one of those people.

Aidan doesn't think he knows how special he is. In fact, he would imagine that most people don't know how special Dean is, just that they're unusually keen to be around him, to share his smiles and his laughs and to listen to him speak. Aidan himself can smell Neverland on him, and it makes his odd homesickness for the place to fade to almost nothing, because he's building up a new home around a man who has all the same kind of magic that Peter Pan and Tinkerbell always carry with them.

As they run up the hill and take off into the sky, over a sea sparkling blue in the early-morning sunshine, the wind whips at Aidan's face, and he holds on for dear life, even harnessed in as he is, and he feels the thrill Dean must have felt every time they flew, his heart thundering in his ears, a shriek just on the edge of his vocal cords, and he thinks about how beautiful Dean is, and how beautiful the world is, and he can't understand why anyone would ever choose anything else, when he can feel the magic of all of this singing in his veins.

Later, they drive down the coast, and park on the edge of the beach. Dean buys them sandwiches from a little shop, and they sit on a blanket on the grass, listening to the car's engine tick as it cools and looking out over the water. Dean's cheeks and nose are wind-burned, but he has a glow about him, full of joy, that Aidan can't help but smile at. When Dean notices, he laughs self-consciously, rubbing a hand through his already-tousled hair. "What?"

Aidan shakes his head. "It was nothing like flying." When Dean's face falls, he snuggles closer to his side, presses a kiss to the corner of his mouth. "That's okay, though. That's more than okay. It's sort of - It's beautiful. It's wonderful." He laughs a little manically, and a crease forms between Dean's eyebrows. "Because _I love you_ , Dean, and I would choose you, and everything you come with, over anything in Neverland."

Dean smiles, insecurity quirking the edge of his lips, dipping into the creases beneath his eyes. "Even flying?" he asks quietly. "Even when the clouds are from Neverland and you can smell the pixie dust?"

Aidan fits himself neatly into Dean's lap, taking his face between his hands. He can smell the turkey and cheese of his sandwich and the sweet metallic scent of his soda on his breath, and somehow, the affection he feels for him swells even more. "I am flying every single day I get to spend with you." He kisses his eyelids. "I've made my choice. You're it for me." He presses their mouths together, his thumbs framing Dean's cheekbones, and Dean leans in, his arms curling around Aidan's back, and Aidan can feel his forever in this moment, and it is marvelous.

He lets Dean take him apart right there: stripped down layer by layer - first clothes and then everything else - all his fears and resentments and apprehensions. He lets Dean brush them away to tumble forgotten into the grass. His thighs cradle Dean's hips, his toes curling and rubbing along the backs of his calves. His fingers press into Dean's shoulder blades, tracing the sharp jut of them - and he almost laughs at the simile his head presents him with: _They're like wings_. 

They rock and press and slide together, their breaths soft and ragged and breathed against each other's mouths, sharing air like there isn't enough of it. Dean's face is serene, clear of the lines that have haunted it for days, the hair at his temples sweat-darkened. His eyelashes flutter against the tops of his cheeks, and Aidan brushes his mouth against his eyelids again, because he is beautiful, and he has never been good at denying himself anything. 

When he comes, Aidan can see Neverland in him: the high-summer heat, the mountains and lush-green trees, the mermaid songs on the edge of the sea. He can feel the cut of Captain Hook's blade and the burst of pixie dust when fairies flutter and dart around him, startled and scolding. But mostly, he can see Dean: the flush high in his cheeks, and the rough breaths that steal out of him, and the way his fingers tighten in the blankets so that they aren't too harsh against Aidan's skin. Aidan runs his fingers through his damp hair and kisses his forehead, soothing. When he comes back to himself, he mouths his way down Aidan's body, and his fingers press in all the places that leave him kicking out his feet and arching his head back.

Not for the first time and not for the last, Dean takes Aidan flying. 

Afterwards, they wrap themselves up in the blanket, their very own cocoon, and let the breeze off the sea cool their skin. Aidan's head is tucked under Dean's chin, and he traces the freckles on his arms with his fingertips. They don't speak, but that doesn't mean much of anything right now. Today, Aidan is happy, and he imagines that most days, he will be happy, because Dean is here, and Dean is consistent and wonderful and better than any adventure Neverland has ever offered. And on the days he's not happy, or Dean's not happy, they'll go hunting for pixies and sunsets and perhaps drive until there is no more driving to be done, until they've had all the adventures there are, and then it will be time to rest.

Aidan presses his mouth to the crown of Dean's shoulder and can taste the magic in his skin.

Fin.


End file.
